Infosys Confluence 2016 - the ups and downs
- Summary:
- Infosys Confluence 2016 was a mixed bag of piece parts that struggled to come together - largely because the location didn't help.
The grueling Spring 2016 conference season is turning out to be a mixed bag. I am wildly behind with reporting on some events but as I make ready for my fifth major customer event in under three weeks, there is no discernible pattern to how these are working out. Infosys Confluence 2016 was marginally better than I had hoped but there were gaps in how it came together.
A big part of the problem lay in the fact Infosys hosted it in the rabbit warren aka the Hilton on O'Farrell Street, San Francisco. While not the worst venue I've ever visited - that honor goes to the now demolished Earls Court site - the Hilton can't cope with an event that has many moving parts.
Infosys wants to project an image of modernity that is born out of education and learning. Whether that is for disadvantaged children in the work that the Infosys Foundation undertakes or design thinking, about which there was plenty of examples on show, the company presents a view of continuing learning as a net good. The trouble is that visitors couldn't get that cohesive sense from the way booths were laid out out in different parts of the building's architecture (sic.)
Then there was the virtual and augmented reality room. I discovered it by accident and was saddened to see so few people poring over the excellent exhibits. Infosys had gone to great trouble to create an interesting space where you could experience the different ways the company is approaching the emerging topic of augmentation and yet it was somehow lost. The good news was that we were treated to what was for me the most inspiring closing keynote I've heard in years.
Dr Hugh Herr, a double amputee and bionics researcher discussed advances in robotic powered prosthetics and exoskeleton technologies that are helping people regain their ability to walk but who are otherwise paralyzed from the waist down. The examples were breathtaking.
He also talked about the potential for augmenting human activity, postulating that in 50 or so years, we will be able to improve the body's ability to do certain tasks and eliminate a swathe of conditions that today seem baffling to scientists.
Speaking from the position of having overcome personal challenges is always refreshing but Herr made the topic wholly believable.
Infosys alignment with that area of research should project an image of forward thinking and service delivery that aligns well with Vishal Sikka, CEO Infosys' oft mentioned topic of expanding the human potential through technology.
Moving sideways, the conversation between ATP and tennis player Stefan Edberg, moderated by the immoderate Pat Cash was wildly entertaining.
In my conversations with ATP, it was easy to see how Infosys is providing the real time infrastructure and analytics to bring sports to life in new and interesting ways for both knowledgable and curious audiences. Again, it is not something with which you would usually associate Infosys, which is working hard to shed its 'Indian outsourcer' image.
The biggest disappointment was the analyst session. Infosys invited some 140 analysts to the event but it was clear from the questions that few have much idea what Infosys is about or the direction it is taking. For example, when the first question comes from a Gartner analyst who asks how Sikka plans to make his oft quoted $20 billion annual revenue number by 2020, it was no surprise to me watching Sikka giggle and say:
I think I should have kept my mouth shut.
That question has been asked and answered on numerous occasions so to repeat it in that context was pointless. Other questions that tried to focus on Mana were almost equally ill informed with one person asking if Infosys is becoming a software company.
Every company wants to be a services business. Why would we want to be a software business? This is about software and services as a coherent offering,
answered a slightly exasperated Sikka. He could have emphasized that the company has recently entered into arrangements to build upon Salesforce Wave for analytics and Trifacta for 'wrangling' data sources. That's something new that almost passed everyone by but which suggests a flexible approach to providing both a platform for analytics build upon open source while partnering for some of the things that matter to customers where it makes sense.
The best question of the session came from an IDC analyst who wanted to understand how Sikka plans to transform his own company to better reflect the digital vision outlined in the keynote. That is a tough question for any CEO and the answers were not wholly convincing.
Sikka's executives do not seem well prepared for providing detailed answers to these kinds of question and so when you go back and review answers given, they sound hollow. Equally, a part of the difficulty lays in the fact Infosys is in the middle of a multi-year transition and so it is difficult to articulate a progress report without getting mired in detail that likely has little bearing on what's happening from a buyer perspective.
There is no doubt that the Infosys story is complex. There are numerous moving parts but the company has yet to distill these into a crisp set of convincing messages that the entire leadership team can articulate with conviction.
The net result is that many of my peers were left uncertain whether the transformation inside the company is real to the point of mattering to buyers of 21st century services. More worrying, the industry analysts didn't really have strong footholds into the strategy upon which to ask the kinds of question that challenge the company in a positive manner.
As I have said before, this is a solvable problem because it is largely a marketing exercise. It is one that all the Indian based outsourcers struggle to articulate but that cannot be a reason to remain in stasis.
Sikka has put many programs in place and this year's Confluence gave a glimpse of what that means. My sense is that the remainder of 2016 and the early part of 2017 will inform us how well each part of the puzzle is working out from the transformation angle. Ultimately, we will need to see evidence of scaling out that transformation into well understood services that are fully aligned with 21st century enterprise needs. I just hope that on 2017, there's a better location from which to showcase those achievements.